SUMMER READING 2024
SUMMER READING CHALLENGE
Mrs Livesey, the AESG School Librarian is really looking forward to meeting you all in September.
We have lots of reading initiatives to look forward to including Library Lessons, BookBuzz, Library Club, reading club, Author events and an open Mic event!
If you would like to send in any ‘extreme read pics’ over the Summer holidays you are welcome to send them to the marketing department via Instagram: @aegirlschool
Remember the more you read the more you grow, the more you grow the more you will know! #ReadtoSucceed
Please see the Year 7 reading suggestions…
Mrs Livesey
SUMMER READING CHALLENGE
Literature
Online article
Non-Fiction
Challenging Read
Poem
Newspaper
Graphic Novel
Magazine
Fiction
Title
SUMMER READING SUGGESTIONS
Black Beauty
"Black Beauty is a handsome, sweet-tempered colt with a strong spirit. As a young colt he is free to gallop in the fresh green meadows with his beloved mother, Duchess, and their kind master. But when his owners are forced to sell him, Black Beauty goes from a life of comfort and kindness to one of hard labour and cruelty. Bravely he works as hard as he can, suffering at the hands of men who treat animals badly. But Black Beauty has an unbreakable spirit and will, and is determined to survive...With a wonderful introduction by awardwinning author Meg Rosoff, Black Beauty is one of the twenty best-loved classic stories being launched in the newly branded Puffin Classics series in March 2015."
Anne Frank
A deeply moving and unforgettable portrait of an ordinary and yet an extraordinary teenage girl. First published over sixty years ago, Anne Frank's Diary of a Young Girl has reached millions of young people throughout the world.In July 1942, thirteen-year-old Anne Frank and her family, fleeing the occupation, went into hiding in an Amsterdam warehouse. Over the next two years Anne vividly describes in her diary the frustrations of living in such close quarters, and her thoughts, feelings and longings as she grows up. Her diary ends abruptly when, in August 1944, they were all betrayed.
SUMMER READING CHALLENGE
The Hobbit
Bilbo Baggins enjoys a quiet and contented life, with no desire to travel far from the comforts of home; then one day the wizard Gandalf and a band of dwarves arrive unexpectedly and enlist his services – as a burglar – on a dangerous expedition to raid the treasure-hoard of Smaug the dragon. Bilbo’s life is never to be the same again.
The Lion, The Watch and The Wardrobe
Four adventurous siblings-Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy Pevensie- step through a wardrobe door and into the land of Narnia, a land frozen in eternal winter and enslaved by the power of the White Witch. But when almost all hope is lost, the return of the Great Lion, Aslan, signals a great change . . . and a great sacrifice.
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is the second book in C. S. Lewis's classic fantasy series, which has been drawing readers of all ages into a magical land with unforgettable characters for over sixty years.
SUMMER READING CHALLENGE
Little Women
"'Rich or poor, we will keep together and be happy in one another' Christmas won't be the same this year for Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy, as their father is away fighting in the Civil War, and the family has fallen on hard times. But though they may be poor, life for the four March sisters is rich with colour, as they play games, put on wild theatricals, make new friends, argue, grapple with their vices, learn from their mistakes, nurse each other through sickness and disappointments, and get into all sorts of trouble. BACKSTORY: Learn all about the author's life and how it inspired her famous story, and find out which of the March sisters you most resemble!"
Northern Lights
Lyra's life is already sufficiently interesting for a novel before she eavesdrops on a presentation by her uncle Lord Asriel to his colleagues in the Jordan College faculty, Oxford. The college, famed for its leadership in experimental theology, is funding Lord Asriel's research into the heretical possibility of the existence of worlds unlike Lyra's own, where everyone is born with a familiar animal companion, magic of a kind works, the Tartars are threatening to overrun Muscovy, and the Pope is a puritanical Protestant. Set in an England familiar and strange, Philip Pullman's lively, taut story is a must-read and re-read for fantasy lovers of all ages.
SUMMER READING CHALLENGE
Skulduggery Pleasant: Kingdom of the Wicked
"The seventh instalment in the biggest, funniest, most thrilling comedy-horror-adventure series in the universe...Magic is a disease. Across the land, normal people are suddenly developing wild and unstable powers. Infected by a rare strain of magic, they are unwittingly endangering their own lives and the lives of the people around them. Terrified and confused, their only hope lies with the Sanctuary. Skulduggery Pleasant and Valkyrie Cain are needed now more than ever. And then there's the small matter of Kitana. A normal teenage girl who, along with her normal teenage friends, becomes infected. Becomes powerful. Becomes corrupted. Wielding the magic of gods, they're set to tear the city apart unless someone stands up against them. Looks like it's going to be another one of those days..."
War Horse
In the deadly chaos of the First World War, one horse witnesses the reality of battle from both sides of the trenches. Bombarded by artillery, with bullets knocking riders from his back, Joey tells a powerful story of the truest friendships surviving in terrible times. One horse has the seen the best and the worst of humanity. The power of war and the beauty of peace. This is his story.
SUMMER READING CHALLENGE
Fight Back
An empowering story about finding your identity and the courage to fight for it. Aaliyah is an ordinary thirteen-year-old living in the Midlandsshe's into her books, shoes, K-pop and she is a Muslim. She has always felt at home where she lives ... until a terrorist attack in her area changes everything.
As racial tensions increase and she starts getting bullied, Aaliyah decides to begin wearing a hijabto challenge how people in her community see her. But when her school bans the hijab and she is intimidated and attacked for her choices, she feels isolated. Soon Aaliyah realises that other young people from different backgrounds also struggle with their identity and feel alone, scared and judged. Should she try to blend in - or can she find allies to help her fight back? Channelling all of her bravery, Aaliyah decides to speak out. Together, can Aaliyah and her friends halt the tide of hatred rippling through their community?
Tyger
From the acclaimed author of Varjak Paw comes a compelling story of a world on the brink of destruction and the magical animal discovered in a London rubbish dump that might just be able to save it.Adam has found something incredible in a rubbish dump in London.A mysterious, mythical, magical animal. A Tyger. And the tyger is in danger.Adam and his friend Zadie are determined to help,but it isn't just the tyger's life at stake. Their whole world is on the verge of destruction. Can they learn to use their powers before it's too late?
SUMMER READING CHALLENGE
Can You See Me?
Tally is eleven years old and she's just like her friends. Well, sometimes she is. If she tries really hard to be. Because there's something that makes Tally not the same as her friends. Something she can't cover up, no matter how hard she tries: Tally is autistic. Tally's autism means there are things that bother her even though she wishes they didn't. It means that some people misunderstand, her and feel frustrated by her.
People think that because Tally's autistic, she doesn't realise what they're thinking, but Tally sees and hears - and notices - all of it.
And, honestly? That's not the easiest thing to live with.
Wonder
'My name is August. I won't describe what I look like. Whatever you're thinking, it's probably worse.' Auggie wants to be an ordinary ten-year-old. He does ordinary things - eating ice cream, playing on his Xbox. He feels ordinary - inside. But ordinary kids don't make other ordinary kids run away screaming in playgrounds. Ordinary kids aren't stared at wherever they go. Born with a terrible facial abnormality, Auggie has been home-schooled by his parents his whole life. Now, for the first time, he's being sent to a real school - and he's dreading it. All he wants is to be accepted - but can he convince his new classmates that he's just like them, underneath it all? "Wonder" is a funny, frank, astonishingly moving debut to read in one sitting, pass on to others, and remember long after the final page.
SUMMER READING CHALLENGE
The House With Chicken Legs
A spellbinding adventure, bound-up with traditional folk and fairy tales, The House with Chicken Legs transports readers to a world of spells and spirits bound by ancient rules and one girl who longs to break free. Marinka dreams of a normal life, she dreams of standing still, but her house has chicken legs and a will of its own and moves on without warning.
For governing Marinka’s world is the powerful and feared Baba Yaga. To some she is a witch, to others the Goddess of Death who guides spirits between this world and the next and she is also Marinka's grandmother. Marinka longs to change her destiny and sets out to break free from her grandmother's footsteps, but her house has other ideas...
Impossible Creatures
The former Waterstones Children's Book Prize winner and author of The Explorer and The Golden Mole delivers the first instalment of a thoroughly immersive epic fantasy series which finds an ordinary boy and a flying girl enmeshed in an adventure with a host of magical creatures.
A boy called Christopher is visiting his reclusive grandfather when he witnesses an avalanche of mythic creatures come tearing down the hill. This is how Christopher learns that his grandfather is the guardian of one of the ways between the non-magical world and a place called the Archipelago: a cluster of magical islands, where all the creatures we tell of in myth live and breed and thrive alongside humans. They have been protected for thousands of years from being discovered; now, terrifyingly, the protection has worn thin, and creatures are breaking through.
SUMMER READING CHALLENGE
When The Sky Falls
As the Second World War escalates and bombs start to fall, Joseph is charged with protecting Adonis the gorilla in this nerve-shreddingly tense thriller based on a true story. 1941. War is raging. And one angry boy has been sent to the city, where bombers rule the skies. There, Joseph will live with Mrs F, a gruff woman with no fondness for children. Her only loves are the rundown zoo she owns and its mighty silverback gorilla, Adonis. As the weeks pass, bonds deepen and secrets are revealed, but if the bombers set Adonis rampaging free, will either of them be able to end the life of the one thing they truly love? Inspired by a true story.
All The Things That Could Go Wrong
There are two sides to every story
Dan is angry. Nothing has been the same since his big brother left, and he’s taking it out on the nearest and weakest target: Alex.
Alex is struggling. His severe OCD makes it hard for him to leave the house, especially when Dan and his gang are waiting for him at school . . . Then the boys’ mums arrange for them to meet up and finish building the raft that Dan started with his brother. Two enemies stuck together for the whole of the school holidays – what could possibly go wrong?
"Books and doors are the same thing. You open them, and you go through into another world." –
Jeanette Winterson